


The Wailing Woman

by Okidokibucky



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Diego is a mommas boy, F/M, Klaus has a roomate, Klaus is a sweetheart, Reader Has Powers, Slow Burn, ben is a cutie too, reader is one of the 43
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-10
Updated: 2019-03-10
Packaged: 2019-11-15 04:37:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18066713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Okidokibucky/pseuds/Okidokibucky
Summary: When Klaus gets a phone call in the middle of the night he doesn't hesitate to help his friend out. After all, who better to help with the dead than the seance himself?orReader is one of the 43 who roommates with Klaus and gets dragged into helping with the apocalypse. The world is ending, so whats the harm in a slow burn?





	The Wailing Woman

**Author's Note:**

> Diego is a soft boy who I'd do anything for and Klaus is Americas sweetheart in disguise. From my Tumblr account lokidokiimagines :)

You didn’t realise how cold it was until you stopped walking. 

The walk to your launderette wasn’t too far from your apartment, a walk you’d grown to loath in the cold wind of March. Your washer-dryer had broken down just before Christmas when a little bag of questionable contents had worked its way into the motor. It was safe to say neither you or your roommate were best pleased.

“ _That was high quality stuff Y/N!” Klaus whined, his head falling into his hands._

_You snorted, “Well maybe you should keep your high quality stuff in a high quality safe place and not the washer!”_

_“It seemed logical at the time I’m sure.”  
_

It wasn’t unusual for Klaus’ little bags to turn up in the strangest of places. Once, he’d hidden his ecstasy pills in with the frozen fish fingers because ‘ _the fish can’t get any higher than they already are, the little heathens’._  But that was the first time his little habit had actually broken something expensive, too expensive for you to replace just yet anyway.

And so, for nearly 4 miserable months you’d been making the twice-weekly walk to your local launderette. Sally, the owner, was a nice old lady who had become enamoured with Klaus ever since she met him. His first trip with you he spent the whole time flirting with her and trying on some of her old skirts from her younger days. In Klaus’ defence, he always managed to pull it off and wore them, freezing weather be damned, each time he decided to accompany you. 

Shivering again you wondered where your laundry was now, bras and socks were probably littered among the streets of New York along with one of Sallys old skirts. You vaguely wondered whether Klaus would forgive you for losing it.

The harbour was empty, save for a few empty shipping containers and the stray animal or two. Your feet seemingly working of their own accord carried you further forward as you wondered how far you’d managed to walk this time. At least 5 miles you reasoned, knowing that your apartment wasn’t the closest to the sea much to Bens disappointment.

You stopped as you felt something wet seep into your socks through the hole in your trainer. It wasn’t unreasonable to think that it was the sea, some spray from that storm a few nights ago that hadn’t quite disappeared yet. Clenching your fists you dug your nails into your palm as you rounded the corner of a high pile of shipping containers.

3 of them. That’s why you’d walked so far.

Under the dull light of a distant lamp you heaved as the light glistened off the blood. Leaning against the container you heaved again as the buzzing noise began to increase, hands on your knees and eyes cast downward you realised that it wasn’t spray from the ocean; you should be so lucky. Blood mixed with the spray had seeped into your shoe, feeling nauseous at the sight you vomited.

Steeling yourself you stood upright and slowly wandered forwards towards the three men, knowing that the buzzing wouldn’t go away otherwise. Pulling your cardigan up to cover your nose from the stench you studied their faces. You didn’t recognise any of them. They looked like normal people, one who seemed greying in a nicely pressed suit while the other wore simple jeans and a hoodie. The strangest though was the third, a rotund man in nothing but a pair of boxers. Burns covered his body in the strangest of places, his ears and nipples being the most prominent. 

You searched your pockets for a phone with numb fingers and shaky hands. Fumbling with the lock pattern you dropped it into the blood beneath your feet.

“Shit!” Picking it up you wiped it on the jacket of the dead guy, mentally apologising for being so rude. Pulling up Klaus’ number you hit call, hoping and praying to _anything_  that he was sober enough to answer.

“Y/N! I was just -”

“It’s happened again.” You interrupt with tears beginning to collect in your eyes, “I think I’m by the harbour and there’s _three_  of them and I don’t know how I got here and -” Your words come out fast and slurred, the cold making it hard for you to talk properly. “- and I just wanna _scream.”_

Klaus shushed someone on the other end of the phone, “Where are you? Don’t scream yet, I’m a little fragile.”

Hugging your body with your spare arm you looked around frantically, “I don’t know! I’m by a load of shipping containers? Near the harbour I think, I can see the sea.” Closing your eyes you felt rain begin to patter down around you.

“ _Is she near Hammerpit or Junior?”_ Someone spoke to Klaus, a voice you hadn’t heard before.

Walking out of the circle of containers you looked up and down the harbour for a sign, “Neither,” You replied as you caught sight of a sign in the distance. “There’s a sign that says ‘Cookies bait shop’ just down the way though.”

Klaus repeated it to someone, “Do you know where that is?” He asked them as you perched on one of the bollards. “ _Yeah, it’s about an hours drive though…How did she get there on foot? It’s miles away.”_  You’d walked farther than you’d thought.

“Klaus I’m _freezing.”_ You whispered, your teeth chattering together now as you began to feel more like yourself again. “It’s so cold -”

“We’re coming, don’t turn into a fish finger just yet.” You could hear a voice and a car engine in the background. “Diego said to stay away from the sea front, you’ll get colder if you stay there.” He paused as you began to walk back towards the inner harbour walls. “Don’t go sleeping with the fishes now Y/N, you -”

Pulling your phone away from your ear the screen faded to black. Just your luck that the battery had to die just when you needed it most. Shoving it into your pocket you sat down on a cold metal bench and waited, wondering who the men were that had been murdered.

* * *

You felt yourself being shaken, “Y/N! Come on I told you not to turn sleep with the fishes!” Opening your eyes you saw Klaus and another man. Sitting up you looked up at Klaus with an apologetic frown, “I lost Sally’s skirt.”

“Maybe I should just leave you here then.” Klaus teased as he pulled you up from the bench. 

“Maybe we should get her into the car before she catches pneumonia.” The other guy spoke, gesturing towards their ride. Nodding vehemently you followed and took his advice on sitting in the passengers seat, ‘The heaters work better up here’. He’d explained as you wrapped yourself in a blanket Klaus had thrown at you off the back seat.

You were thankful for your friend coming to get you, and to the stranger who had managed to get him here so quickly. “Thank you Klaus,” You mumbled after a moment or two of having your face mushed up against the car heater. “And you too.” Shooting the stranger a quick smile of thanks he started the engine and began the drive back into the city.

“This is Diego, my brother.” Racking your brain you could vaguely remember Klaus mentioning his brother. From what you could remember he had four, Ben who you’d already met, five who had gone missing when they were young and another called Luther. “Right, Klaus mentioned you a few times.” Turning in your seat you got a quick look at him in the light of passing street lamps. “Knife guy right?”

He let out a quick bark of laughter, “That’s me, knife guy.”

You hummed in your seat, “Ben told me about you a bit too.” Letting your eyes close you missed the sideways look he gave you. Looking back at Klaus who just shrugged, he settled his eyes on the road ahead, figuring you were perhaps just as strange as Klaus. It would, after all, explain why you were roommates with his brother.

“So did they have their brains blown out or what?” Breaking the silence Klaus leaned forward between the two front seats, his olive eyes on you.

“Jesus Klaus!” You felt the car swerve a little, your nausea making its way back with the motion.

“All different, one…” You mumbled, the cold dead gaze of the people you found flashing in your mind. “One of them was just in his underpants, had some sort of burns on his nipples and earlobes.”

“Wowee now _that’s_  what I call a good way to go,” Klaus giggled, resting back into the backseat again. “Jesus…” Diego muttered, his face scrunched up in disgust.

“Oh don’t start making everything about you.” Klaus whispered to the space next to him, “We’ll get waffles later.”

It was strange with Ben. You’d seen him before and could probably draw a semi-accurate picture from memory, but you couldn’t see him all the time. At first you were a little freaked out when some strange Korean guy pulling funny faces at a cat sat outside your window appeared in your apartment, until Klaus saw you staring at him anyway.

_“Can you see him?”_

_You scoffed, “Can’t you? Who is he?”_

After that Klaus and Ben sat you down with a nice martini a la Klaus (Which in other words is a glassful of gin with half a dried lemon in it) and explained that Ben was actually dead, and had been for quite some time.

“ _Are you sure you’re dead?” You drawled as you took another sly look at the man. “Because you don’t look dead.” You threw the accusation that he was lying at him as you took another mouthful of gin._

_“Last time I checked…Yeah.”  
_

Since then the three of you had lived in almost perfect harmony. You could hear Klaus shouting some nights at seemingly thin air, mostly when he was higher than a kite about how ‘ _it’s his life to waste if he wants to and Ben can’t change his mind’._ You hadn’t figured out yet why Ben seemed to appear and disappear from your vision at random points, but you didn’t mind, you’d always continue your conversation right back off where you’d left it.

_“_ What were you doing out there anyway?” Diego spoke, ignoring his brothers seemingly insane ranting in the backseat. “It’s freezing out and you’re not exactly dressed for late night hiking.” Referencing your thin cardigan and tracksuit bottoms you pulled the blanket further around yourself.

Blushing you tried to search for the right way to explain yourself without seeming completely deranged. “It’s a bit like how Klaus can see the dead.” You started, your fingers toying with the tassels on the blanket. “I don’t ever mean to find them, but sometimes I’ll be going somewhere and before I even realise how I’d got there there’s…” You trail off into silence, letting the obvious fill the void. “It’s just my bad luck that this time I was walking to the launderette.” You chuckled humourlessly as you looked over at a smirking Diego.

“Oh so it was  _your_  underwear we saw on the drive here then?” He joked, earning a tired laugh from you. 

“Oh the red lacy ones? They were mine actually.” Klaus piped up from the back seat, making the three of you laugh once again. It felt nice to laugh easily, the shock from finding them hadn’t quite worn off yet so it was nice to keep your mind occupied. 

Klaus leaned forward again, “So did you do that scream this time?”

You weren’t sure, did you scream? Your mind was in such a haze you couldn’t even really remember ringing Klaus properly. “I think it’s normal to scream when you find a pile of dead bodies Klaus.” 

“No it’s different when she screams, it brings you to your knees and _not_  in a good way may I just add.” Leaning back he kicked his feet up and yawned, “It’s almost like she’s wailing.”

Leaning against the window you pulled the blankets tight around you and tried to drift off to sleep without seeing the bodies again. 

* * *

For the second time that night you found yourself being shook awake. Blinking your eyes open you looked over at Diego who gestured outside. You were home, having slept for most of the journey you were surprised to find that you didn’t dream about the bodies this time. Grateful for the peaceful sleep you sat up and yawned. “What time is it?”

“4:32am.” Diego answered as you watched your apartment lights flick on. Figuring Klaus must have already gone up you unbuckled your seat belt. You’d been out longer than you thought, figuring you must had left for Sally’s at around 8pm.

“Thanks for coming to pick me up, I can only imagine what a pain in the ass Klaus was on the ride here.” Hoping that your apology and gratefulness came through, you smiled at the man beside you.

“Nah he was alright, truth was I don’t think I’ve seen him that upset or worried since Ben died.” You sat in silence for a moment. “Otherwise I think I would have thought he was being dramatic. He seems to worry about you a lot.” Feeling a wave of guilt wash over you at the thought of causing your friend worry, a tight lipped smile worked its way onto your face.

“I wish he wouldn’t, he has enough to deal with without worrying about me too.” Sighing to yourself you opened the car door and got out.

“Hey Y/N,” Diego called as you were about to leave, bending down you looked back at him. “I don’t think he minds. Stay safe, yeah?”

You smiled back at him earnestly and gave a small wave, “See you later Diego.”

Walking up the steps to your apartment you pushed the door, glad to finally be home. “I’m counting on it.” You heard behind you before the sound of a car faded into the distance.

 


End file.
